


Swooning (and other hazards of marriage proposals)

by fiertia



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Post-Blue Lions Route, Post-Game, and some kisses because...kisses, talking out some feelings, that's it. just fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-15
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-09-01 18:45:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20262787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fiertia/pseuds/fiertia
Summary: Get this man a fainting couch and some smelling salts.An extension of Ferdinand's S support conversation with Byleth.





	Swooning (and other hazards of marriage proposals)

“...I cannot stay upright. Please let me lean on your shoulder.”

Before Ferdinand could begin to berate himself for imposing on his fiancee - _ his fiancee! _ \- in such a way, Byleth’s face gentled into a smile as she nodded.

Still overcome by astonished, relieved joy and in no way presenting himself as dashingly noble like he had imagined he would, Ferdinand seated himself next to Byleth at the edge of the church well. He dearly hoped he didn’t faint in front of her. (Then again, he could think of worse fates than being revived by his concerned beloved.) Her eyes glinted mischievously, like she knew how jittery he felt. He would be frustrated with her if he weren’t so gloriously happy. The only way to escape her perceptive gaze, obviously, was to lay his head on her shoulder posthaste and attempt to regain his composure.

It didn’t work.

With his head resting on her shoulder, her face was close. Very close. So close he could see the subtle variations of darker and lighter shades of green within her eyes. So close he could see a soft blush staining her cheeks and faint scars around her brow. He wanted to press kisses to those cheeks and those scars, but he also didn’t want to presume...

He didn’t feel Byleth tense, exactly, but she held herself very still, which jostled Ferdinand out of his reverie. He could imagine the look of bemused concentration on her face that she had often worn in social situations - especially during the first year of their acquaintance. No doubt her brows would be pulled together and her nose would be crinkled adorably. 

Was this too much touching for her? He knew she’d had a sheltered upbringing, with an awkwardness during human interaction that almost rivaled her decisive confidence during combat. He vividly recalled her, solitary and a bit stiff, positioned off to the side during the ball all those years ago while his classmates and Seiros knights waltzed about the room. Thinking back with growing horror at his own presumptiveness, he had only ever really seen her in close physical proximity to others when dealing with wounded soldiers or when being treated for wounds herself. He would be dishonoring himself as a noble - nay, as Byleth’s partner - if he made her uncomfortable, so he would remove himself from her person at once --

“You’ve gone strangely quiet, Ferdie. What’s wrong?”

Her words, especially her favorite nickname for him - borrowed from Dorothea, of course - were feather-soft and rustled his hair. When had she leaned her head on his?

“Does your crest gift you mind-reading abilities as well? I...I must admit that I worried I was taking too much of a liberty in using your shoulder for support and causing you discomfort, something I am loath to do.”

She puffed out a breath. One of her soft, quiet laughs. She found this _ funny _? He was being as forthright with her as he could. Perhaps she could tell that he felt affronted, because her right hand brushed against his left one, then grasped it with surprising gentleness. Her palm was callused and warm.

“I won’t lie and say this kind of thing - this kind of relationship - isn’t new to me. It is. I don’t know if I’ve ever spoken of it much to you, but prior to Sothis regaining consciousness in Remire village, memories and emotions were - were slippery for me. Even if I felt them, they were weak and...never felt quite real.” She spoke in a slow hush, choosing her words with care. He felt her cheek shift against his hair as she spoke.

“I had never even cried before seeing my father die. Thinking back, something about Sothis waking up and then being around everyone at the monastery opened up something in me, I think. It’s like I was living life with a veil between me and the world before that, and as I spent time living and working at the monastery, the veil gradually faded away.”

Shifting to look up at her, he said, “You were so solemn and remote when you first came to the academy. My theory, at least at first, was that your manner was a front to garner your students’ respect. Of course, once I joined your class, I saw that you showed care for the people around you in subtle ways, always devoting your full attention to whoever spoke with you. I learned to read your expressions, initially just to prove to myself that I could. You must have found me insufferable, truly! That reminds me - I think the first time I saw you smile was during the feast after the mock battle in Gronder Field.”

Her eyes grew distant. “That sounds about right. No, not the insufferable, part, you silly goose. It’s just - everyone was so boisterous then.” Chuckling, she added, “It wasn’t only you, Ferdie. I startled at Caspar’s battle cries. Bernadetta’s shrieks made me jump out of my lecture chair. Sylvain’s dramatic sighs and endless propositions confused me. In a way, I viewed the challenge of socializing with everyone as another combat schema I needed to learn how to handle, which I’m sure led to a fair share of the stone-faced impression I gave off. It was how I coped in unfamiliar territory.”

“Then, at that banquet, everyone sat at the same tables and talked over each other. Raphael slapped me on the back with enough force that I almost fell over, Lorenz immediately launched into one of his diatribes on proper conduct, and Sylvain laughed so hard at that whole display he cried. I couldn’t help but smile. I had never felt so...at home. And proud. Especially since other classes’ students, like you, had joined Blue Lions recently. Our victory then felt very sweet.” She sighed, her shoulder relaxing slightly under Ferdinand. “What a time to grow stronger feelings, right? Things deteriorated so rapidly after that.”

She quieted for a moment and then shifted to face him, taking both of his hands in hers. “I don’t want to be overly-serious on one of the happiest days of my life, but I don’t know what I would have done if I’d had to face you on a battlefield during the war. I’m so glad we fought for the same cause. It would have broken me to fight you.” Her voice trembled slightly, a huge display of feelings from her.

Ferdinand once again chose to take more liberty with his fiancee than he likely should at this stage in their new courtship, raising his hand to cup her cheek in his palm. He just didn’t know how else to convey his feelings fully. Words seemed insufficient.

As he stroked his thumb across her cheekbone, he said, “Siding with Faerghus and with the Church was not a decision that came lightly to me, as you well know.” She nodded, eyes wide and thoughtful. “I often wondered if I made the right choice - if I had forsaken everything I thought I held dear. I abandoned my home country; people I knew from childhood called me traitorous with sincere contempt. They still do, in fact. They likely always will.”

Tenderly cradling her face with his hands, Ferdinand paused. He had already confessed his love once - surely it wouldn’t be excessive for him to do so again? If he were being perfectly honest, he hoped that he could continue profess his ardor as often as possible once he overcame his frustrating habit of becoming embarrassingly bashful in the process. A love like this should be shouted from the rooftops, in his opinion. (An idea he would certainly file away for later. The monastery had many suitably dramatic rooftops for such a purpose.)

Somehow, in all his inward focus, Ferdinand’s eyes strayed to fix upon Byleth’s mouth. His heart somersaulted with the fierce desire to kiss her. But now was _ not _the time for him to be distracted from his purpose!

He forged on, hoping - no, needing - that she understood him. “However, I would not change a single choice I made these past six years, for they led you and I to this point. Fighting alongside you, I learned that I can aspire to more than simply embodying the perfect nobleman.” Here he stumbled again, his voice breaking. “The...the privilege of being your suitor is not something I take lightly, and I know we can support each other in both our joys and our sorrows. I am so glad, so lucky, to be here with you.”

Byleth gazed at him with her full attention. Those eyes of hers could - intentionally or not - intimidate with such ease. His face flushed under her regard. Was that speech of his too much? He always let his mouth run away with him, he knew. He simply felt desperate, now that he’d started, to continue (however clumsily) expressing the depth of his feelings to his beloved. For months, Ferdinand had penned flowery love poems dedicated to her, but all his painstakingly-crafted verses seemed to have fled his mind when he most wanted to recall them. He felt very exposed and vulnerable; he was sure she could hear his heart, so strongly and quickly it was beating.

“Ah, please say something, Byleth. I beg for mercy. A man can only take so much suspense before he faints straight away,” he pleaded, only partially in jest.

It couldn’t be just his imagination that her eyes seemed to sparkle with humor. 

“I’ll tell you as often as possible, Ferdinand: I love you dearly. Never doubt that. I can’t imagine a truer, more chivalrous person to share my life with, and I’m glad we emerged from the war together. Well, glad is an understatement, I think. Words are hard.” Byleth paused briefly with a sigh. Then she directed a considering look at his lips. “Now, there’s something I really want to try, if you’re willing.”

“Anything.” He spoke without thinking, of course, but he meant it.

She looked down to her lap, a rare display of hesitancy. “Ah...um...would you kiss me? Please?”

Oh! He did _ not _ expect that request. Immediately - unavoidably - his gaze fell to her lips. He very much wanted to kiss her, too. _ But propriety must be attended to _, he weakly reminded himself. So, erring on the side of caution, Ferdinand elegantly (well, an attempt was made at elegance) lifted her small, callused hand. Her eyes met his again, and he softly brushed his lips across her knuckles. He was rather pleased to find his hand wasn’t trembling overmuch, and that her eyes were definitely, absolutely sparkling now.

Then Byleth chuckled, a full smile lighting up her face.

“W-was that not…” he started to ask, trailing off as his fiancee leaned forward to trace his lips with her fingers, the feather-soft touch sending tingles up and down his spine. _ Oh. _

“May I...could I kiss you here, Ferdinand?” she breathed. His heart gave a great thump. If words hadn’t utterly failed him for what felt like the thousandth time in her presence, he would have pointed out that she still looked rather playful and perhaps even a bit smug, like the cat that got the cream. He wanted nothing more than to see her look like that as often as possible. Holding his breath in spellbound anticipation, he nodded.

They were already sitting very close, knees touching, but now Byleth scooted nearly into his lap so that she could reach him better. Resting her hand on his chest, she tilted her head up, her gaze roving from his eyes to his lips. He swallowed, knowing she could feel the racing of his heart. This close, Ferdinand caught the faint smell of mint and lavender from her - she must have visited the greenhouse earlier. She was shorter than him, so he leaned down to meet her, his unruly hair slipping past his shoulders to curtain their faces.

Finally, their lips met, sending sparks throughout his body. Dizzily, Ferdinand noticed that Byleth was trembling slightly. He no more experience with kissing - he would have dishonored himself as a noble by kissing any other than his betrothed, of course - so their first kiss was tentative, cautious, and a bit clumsy. Seeking more closeness, he rested his hand at the juncture of her neck and shoulder, then angled his head so that he could reach her better. She made a soft sound between a sigh and a gasp, then took advantage of their better position to kiss him more firmly. When she slid her tongue along the seam of his lips, he melted. _ Good goddess _. The impulse to embrace her more tightly gripped him but he also wanted to check in with her and make sure she was enjoying herself.

Ferdinand moved slightly away, parting from her lips with a shaky exhale. Byleth’s heavy-lidded gaze left him feeling both confident and completely disarmed. Fumbling to remember what he wanted to say, he asked, “Are you...is this...good?” Egads, where had his eloquence gone?

Byleth nodded with a small smile and touched his cheek with her lovely, battle-toughened hand. “Are _ you _alright?”

“Y-yes. I can’t have imagined a more wonderful kiss.”

Taking that as encouragement, Byleth carded her fingers through his hair and cupped the back of his head in her palm. Her eyes gleamed in the sunset’s roseate glow. “Can we kiss again, then? I want to see if we can outdo your imagination some more.”

This woman! Ferdinand was quickly realizing she had a strong impish streak underneath all her reserved strength. Because words were difficult for him to grasp, he answered her by feathering his lips along her jaw and cheek. Byleth shivered and grabbed his lapel tightly as he finally breathed a yes into her ear, slowly kissing back down toward her mouth. She preempted him, though, turning her head to capture his lips with hers before he had finished his journey.

This time her kiss felt purposeful and seeking rather than tentative. She opened her lips, and when he opened his in response, she slid her tongue into his mouth. She tasted faintly of the fruity sorbet they’d shared in the dining hall earlier - sweet and tart. He found it intoxicating, and in his surprise Ferdinand managed to forget to be self-conscious. Byleth’s eagerness to explore his mouth spread to him, so thoughts of propriety and decorum fled as groaned softly and entwined his tongue with hers. 

Soon they were a tangle of limbs perched on the edge of the well, hands twisted in each others’ hair or grasping for purchase at clothes. It felt like Ferdinand’s blood had turned to honey, warm and heady. He could never have imagined a kiss with Byleth would be like this (and much to his chagrin as a gentleman, he had _ definitely _imagined kissing Byleth on numerous occasions, especially recently.) Her gently demanding exploration of his mouth spread delicious electric tingles throughout his body, drawing out rather indecorous sounds from him. He wanted to never stop kissing her.

At some point, Byleth climbed fully into his lap, her tights snagging on his coat and her ridiculous coat wrapping around them. She overbalanced Ferdinand and they snapped out of their kiss to a frightening moment in which they almost tumbled down into the well. Not good. Grabbing at each other and the rough stone lip of the well for purchase, they shared a shocked look, both breathing hard. Byleth was a picture: hair mussed adorably, lips kiss-swollen and wet, eyes wide, and cheeks rosier than he’d ever seen them. Ferdinand imagined he looked similarly wrecked.

So much for pursuing this courtship with restraint, he chided himself, trying to breathe evenly and regain his sensibilities. But_ , _ he thought, when had Byleth - or their relationship, for that matter - been sensible or conventional?

Then Byleth started laughing - starting from a small, amazed chuckle and building to full-body gasps of amusement. Her laughter was infectious. Ferdinand snickered, then laughed, then guffawed until he had to wipe tears from his eyes. She wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his chest, and he finished out his spell of laughter with his head tucked into her neck.

Eventually, he sighed and pulled back to look at his fiancee. He used the excuse of straightening her hair to run his fingers through it some more. “You and I are a mess.”

“Oh, definitely,” she said. “I suppose our next kiss should be scheduled for somewhere more suited to...well, kissing.” She fiddled with his very skewed cravat.

He was inclined to agree, but…

“That would be a problem, Byleth.”

Her brow furrowed and she looked adorably confused for a moment. “Why?”

“Well, I should think anywhere and everywhere would be suited to kissing you.”

Her eyes widened. “Everywhere?”

Perhaps he shouldn't have blurted that out. After all, now that he thought about it, some places _ were _definitely more suited to kissing than others. The Sealed Forest was rather...unromantic, as one example. "What I mean to say is...um. I would always want to kiss you, even at the risk of mortal peril…” his voice trailed off. Somehow the bit about mortal peril had sounded less silly and more romantic in his poetry.

Still, Byleth's eyes softened as she smiled and lifted herself from his lap to stand. Holding her hand out to him, she said, “How dashing of you, my brave knight. Still, I would be put out if either of us injured ourselves, so I think we should definitely find better places to kiss from now on. Or at least more comfortable ones.” She looked pointedly at the bumpy stone walls of the well.

Grasping her proffered hand and standing, Ferdinand said, feeling recklessly bold, “If you are amenable to suggestions, might I note that you now have your own wing of the monastery to yourself?”

**Author's Note:**

> i didn't expect to like ferdinand so much but i ultimately found him very endearing. and yall, the s support for ferdinand is so cute. please watch it. i listened to the japanese dub of it, in which he basically says "oh no now your face is too close!!" during the cg portion instead of the more overtly romantic stuff they put in the english localization, which sent me down the path of writing this fic. also, this was originally supposed to be like a paragraph long drabble. oops.
> 
> this was written with the blue lions house's ending in mind, since that's the route i just finished. i ended up really liking it. now on to golden deer! :^)


End file.
